- Law firms are split between training to accommodate new technological developments and training to enhance their ROI on their current technologies.
- Some are trying to wring out any additional leverage they can from their current tools.
- Others are looking to learn about generative AI offerings and other tools available to them while mitigating risks.
As the legal world works to make sense of the opportunities and challenges posed by recent breakthroughs in generative AI, many law firms are proceeding gingerly when it comes to putting this new technology into practice, instead looking to wring out more leverage from their existing tools by providing “refreshers” on the resources at attorneys’ current disposal.
Although some firms are looking to gain an edge on the competition and are looking at training aimed at newer technology, Estrada Legal Consulting principal and founder Edward Estrada noted that the larger trend at play is that law firms are returning to and refreshing the ways they use their current technology instead of adapting their training to new technology.
“Firms are spending more time educating their people internally with the tools that already exist which may not be being fully utilized,” he said, describing one firm facing internal pushback on training on new items while partners, associates and staff “were still trying to understand the existing tools they had and the existing resources they had.”
“The lawyers didn’t really understand what they had, and now new solutions were being rolled out,” he explained. “[It made] the firm pause and say, ‘hold on a second, we’re trying to layer on technology [when employees] don’t understand what we had and why there’s a need for this tech.’”
Overall, Estrada is seeing firms double down on their existing tools and “making sure they’re getting returns on the investment they’ve already made before truing to educate on new technologies that are emerging,” an effort that he said dovetailed well with return-to-office efforts as firms consider how to make the most of attorneys’ office time.
However, this overarching effort to increase current leverage from tools does not preclude some firms from looking ahead and trying to adapt to the rise of new tools at their disposal.
“I think that there are some forward thinking firms that … have those cultures of innovation and adoption [and] understand their resources really well,” he said, although he remained confident this wasn’t the case for a majority of Am Law 100 firms.
But Kevin Iredell, chief marketing officer of Second Hundred firm Lowenstein Sandler, maintains that some firms are actively working to familiarize their personnel with cutting-edge AI tools. He noted in a written statement that the majority of firms that he’s spoken with “are focusing ‘training’ efforts on getting to know the different platforms” such as Bard, ChatGPT, and offerings from Thompson Reuters and Lexis Nexis.
Gina Rubel, founder and CEO of Furia Rubel Communications, indicated that smaller and midsize firms were also reaching out to her for training, observing a particular hunger for training from marketers and legal operations professionals.
“They are going and seeking it on their own even if their law firm isn’t providing any,” she said.
Yet the desire for resources and training isn’t limited to marketing professionals. According to executive coach and former DLA Piper partner Laura Terrell, the need for training is firmwide, encompassing staff, associates and partners.
When it comes to work done by junior associates and paralegals, Terrell noted that “some of the things that you learn in the first few years of your legal career, like drafting templates and explaining case law, those are things that may be handled by technology.”
“You’re going to need different training and analysis for that work, like for applying law to the unique facts to the case. That’s something that usually takes years for associates to master and now they will have to learn it sooner,” she explained. “Firms will have to change their training approach.”
Terrell spotted the need for additional training among partners as well, highlighting particular issues with oversight, accuracy and knowledge of firm policy.
“I talked to a partner at a firm I work with and the partner said, ‘I don’t really know what our policy is,’” she said. “If [a firm’s] partners tend to be older and not comfortable [with the technology], they may not know how to look for signs of issues with accuracy.”
“A good partner will ask associates to look at cases they cited,” she concluded. “There may need to be a more hands-on approach.”
Although some firms offer their own training internally, Rubel noted that smaller and midsize firms don’t have the same resources to offer their own trainings, with some choosing to enlist her services instead to provide attorneys and staff the information they need.
Rubel’s training highlights the importance of case uses for new technologies, as well as dives down the rabbit hole of benefits, opportunities, policy considerations, and risks posed by the rise of generative AI.
Iredell also had some insight as to how firms were conducting training, observing that “some firms have developed robust training programs on specific use cases or systems, and some have been more ad hoc committees to explore what’s possible and best practices.”
According to Iredell, his own firm “developed a policy that encourages exploration and familiarization while setting guardrails to protect [the firm’s] systems, data privacy, confidentiality, and client information.”
Ultimately, Rubel felt that all firms need to be training in some regard referencing new technologies and generative AI.
“They need to be training, bottom line, training everyone,” she said. “[It is] every law firm’s responsibility to train everyone in the firm to use the technology that’s at their disposal. … [That’s] why a lot of firms block them at first because they haven’t done training. … [It’s the] safest way to move forward if you’re not going to start training [right away].”
Source: Law.com
